Groups again challenge county's holiday displays policy

WEST CHESTER – The debate over winter holiday displays on the front lawn of the Chester County Historic Courthouse continued Tuesday at the county commissioners’ meeting, but this time with a distinct twist.

Think fusilli. Or cavatappi. Or any other spiral pasta.

Two representatives of a group associated with the semi-satirical Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, or Pastafarians, made a request to have one of its displays – a tree with pasta-themed ornaments – included with the traditional holiday tree, crčche, and Menorah that adorn the courthouse in December.

Tracy McPherson of Thornbury, who identified herself as a minister of the Evangelical Pastafarian Church, told the commissioners that she had been dismayed last year when she drove by the courthouse in downtown West Chester and noticed the lack of any display concerning her faith.

“It would be meaningful to our congregation to see our faith recognized on public property at the Chester County Courthouse in the same way that the Christian and Jewish religions are currently acknowledged,” said McPherson, who was accompanied by Thomas Reistle of Coatesville in making the request.

“The holiday season is very important to Pastafarians, as it coincides with out primary holiday, which is called Holiday,” McPherson said. “It is a time of joyful feasting, with unlimited pasta and grog, the favored drink of our Lord.”

McPherson’s request, which she insisted was quite serious, came prior to a presentation by the leader of the Freethought Society of Greater Philadelphia, Margaret Downey of Birmingham, to have the group’s “Tree of Knowledge” included in the courthouse display.

Downey, who has made it somewhat of a holiday tradition of her own to ask that the group’s display be recognized as equal to the Menorah and crčche, accused the commissioners of treating her fellow atheists as “second class citizens” and demeaning them by refusing to include the tree.

The Tree of Knowledge, with its ornaments of a variety of books promoting education and questioning religion, had been included in the display until recent years, when the county adopted a policy allowing for no displays from outside groups. All the figures now used in the display are county-owned.

In addition to the religious figures and holiday tree, display items include secular ones such as candy canes, a winter sleigh, and banners proclaiming “Happy Holidays” and “Peace on Earth.”

Although she criticized the commissioners for not responding to earlier requests to have the group’s tree included, Downey offered to compromise by letting the three commissioners choose which of the many ornaments would not be hung on the tree if they found them offensive.

“Our goal is to be included with fellow citizens in the 2012 winter holiday season,” Downey said.

Her comments drew a rebuke from Controller Val DiGiorgio, who also serves as chairman of the county Republican Committee, and who said that the commissioners should stick to the current policy and not give in to Downey’s demands for inclusion. He said the Freethought Society’s tree had proven “offensive to people of faith” in the past.

That stance, in turn, led to Commissioner Kathi Cozzone to question whether the commissioners should revisit the current policy, which she had originally opposed, and allow any group that wanted to be included to have a spot on the courthouse lawn.

“We can address again whether this resolution is appropriate,” she said.

However, Cozzone declined to press the matter in a formal motion at Tuesday’s session, but may take it up again on Thursday after a discussion between the commissioners and county Solicitor Thomas Whiteman.

Commissioner Ryan Costello, in questioning Cozzone’s suggestion, stressed that he saw no reason to revise the current policy and would oppose any such motion.

The Pastafarian presentation may have left some in the audience at the commissioners’ meeting scratching their noodle, so to speak, but the group has indeed had an impact on the issue of public displays of religious holiday figures and the role of religion in public policy in recent years.

Most recently, officials in Santa Monica, Calif., decided to do away with holiday displays in a public park because of a dispute between religious groups and local atheists, who were joined by members of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. And in 2008, the group was given permission to erect a statue of its deity, His Noodly Appendages, on a courthouse lawn in Crossville, Tenn.

In 2007, the group essentially forced school board members in Polk County, Fla., to back down from pushing through curriculum changes to allow teaching of intelligent design, or creationism, in the schools there.

“Many people find my religion laughable,” McPherson told the commissioners, who seemed to take her presentation seriously. But “in the words of Isaac Asimov, one man’s religion is another man’s belly laugh.”